Blockchain employs around 25 people in London but also has
offices in Luxembourg and New York. The company is the world's
biggest provider of digital wallets for bitcoin, with over 50%
market share, and processes over 150,000 transactions a day on
average. It has raised over $30 million (£23.9 million) to date.

Smith declined to give specific numbers on activity, but says:
"It'll be the first month where millions and millions of people
use us," adding that the day the election result was announced
"was the biggest single day increase we've seen in the last
year."

Smith was talking to BI for the launch of a new feature on
Blockchain's platform that allows customers to buy and sell
bitcoins from within its wallets.

He says: "One of the things that's been different about our
product for a long time is you're not depositing your bitcoin
with us, you're just getting the infrastructure that lets you
manage your own private key. The trade off there historically has
been if you have a wallet like that you can't buy and sell the
bitcoin from that wallet.

"What's more exciting from an industry perspective is at the
moment if you buy bitcoin, it's kind of like a 2 to 3 day
experience. You buy them and 2-5 days later you actually get
them. It's a little weird. What's really exciting about this
product if you get the bitcoin instantly, you pay for them and
about 5-6 minutes later you get them."

The new feature launches in the UK on Monday and will be across
the UK and eurozone by the end of the month. Smith hopes to have
the feature launched across the US and parts of Latin America by
the end of the first quarter of 2017.

Smith says he was not tempted to launch the new feature in the US
instead of the UK, given the surge in activity there. He says:
"We want to go UK first because it's our home market. It's
easiest to manage. The other thing is this isn't going to be over
in a week. This is going to drag on for a while."

Smith says he expects the new feature to lead to a "big uptick"
in activity on the platform. Coinify Co-Founder and CEO Mark
Højgaard says in a press release announcing the new features:
"With Blockchain’s dominant position in the cryptocurrency wallet
market, I believe this will be a real game changer.”